Let’s Talk, Sing, and Write About Celine

As the subject for a serious music book, Céline Dion––amazing or not––seems like an odd choice. In the latest book in the 33⅓ series, however––a series which typically looks at albums like the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds or Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures or the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main St.––Carl Wilson, probably Toronto’s pre-eminent music critic, takes it upon himself to “[strive] to understand Céline’s global popularity,” in the process “fac[ing] the question of what drives personal taste––and whether it’s possible to change it.” Wilson, needless to add, is a brave, brave man.
It’s only fitting that the book, Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste, is launched in typical Dion fashion: oddly, and spectacularly. At the Gladstone Ballroom (1214 Queen Street West) on Wednesday night, as part of the ever-excellent This Is Not A Reading Series, Mark Kingwell will interview Wilson; Final Fantasy, Laura Barrett, and The Blankett (plus an unnamed extra performer, maybe!) will play Dion cover songs; Laura Landauer, a Celine Dion impersonator, will perform an excerpt from “Celine Speaks”; and Brian Joseph Davis will DJ.
The totally free festivities get underway at 7:30 p.m.